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Sunday, 2 November 2014

FetLife vs OKCupid

FetLife, for those who may not know, is an online community where every fetish, sexuality and perversion is welcome. It is where like-minded people can meet or find out about events.

OKCupid is a mainstream dating site/app. I have used both to meet with others, but which has been the more successful?

I dabbled with OKCupid to begin with. But I'm a non-monogamous dominant man with a somewhat submissive background. Not the sort that should be on a conventional dating site, right? Not getting anywhere I turned to FetLife.

Here I found out about events such as Camden Crunch and London Alternative Market. I briefly met people online then got to know them better in real life at such events. I've been on FetLife for a couple of years now and, thanks to this site have learnt a lot and met some wonderful folk. It has, however, been a massive failure for dating.

The reasons I think this may be are, firstly, that FetLife seems to attract men who think by joining such a site they can get an easy lay. It's therefore hard to convince that this is not my expectation. Perhaps because of this, those dates I have had via FetLife have always (though there haven't been too many) been with ladies who, although friendly, seem to have a hardened attitude and harsher expectations. Or they joined FetLife because they were a bit curious about being dominated and then decided it was not for them at the last minute.

OKCupid has, however, been a revelation. It's not entirely the vanilla meeting place I first thought it was. When I first gave it a go I played down my dominant side and kinky interests. Recently deciding to give it another try I made this more obvious (whilst ensuring I didn't come across as one of those who simply want an easy lay - I emphatically do not want this.)

I have met some wonderful ladies thanks to OKCupid, both online and in real life. I don't want to become a serial dater with dozens of lovers - I don't have the energy, I like to connect with people and one of the unwritten rules in my marriage is that there's a limit to how many people I can be with.

Maybe I should give FetLife another go too, but for now OKCupid is proving to be particularly fulfilling.